06/24/06 "Information
Clearing House" -- --- At a panel on the state of the world’s
media hosted by Columbia University in New York last April, the
veteran journalist Robert Fisk expressed outrage at the semantic
distortion that bedevils understanding of events that affect us
all and, worse, affect a great many people in ways that are
unimaginable (in great part thanks to media versions) for the
rest. He suggested that the New York Times, so prone to citing
different “officials” might just as well call itself “American
Officials Say”. The coverage of the recent strife in
newly-independent Timor-Leste is a salient case of this. The
media, especially the Australian media (News from the Department
of Foreign Affairs and Trade), has offered a particularly
distorted view of the crisis. Such misrepresentations are
endlessly repeated until they become “truth” in the public
conscience, but they also offer confirmation of the old adage
that one way to the truth is by comparison of the lies.

The prism through which the events in Timor-Leste are presented
is that of the “failed state”. These words are meant to ring
alarm bells and Australian Defence Minister, Brendan Nelson
wasted no time in pointing out that failed state equals
terrorism: "If East Timor is allowed to be a failed state in our
region, we know that it will be a target for trans-national
crime, also for terrorism […].” The “failed state” tag in
Australia has the added advantage of hinting at the evils lying
in wait in the legitimate aspirations of the people of West
Papua to independence, a very thorny diplomatic issue with
Indonesia (which, though it is never mentioned, ranks number 32
on the 2006 Foreign Policy Failed States Index, below Malawi and
Burkina Faso and more failed than Angola and Togo).

Evil is represented as embodied in the figure of one person.
Identifying a single scapegoat suggests that his removal will
magically make all well again. Many people today think of
“Muslim” and “terrorist” as related, if not synonymous terms.
The Muslim Prime Minister of Timor-Leste, Mari Alkatiri, appears
in the press through man-in-the-street interviews as a
“terrorist” (not to mention “traitor” and “killer”), a word that
then returns press-verified and reinforced to the street. What
lies behind these depictions of Alkatiri?

The present situation in Timor-Leste is very difficult, and
Australia has not a little to do with it by putting Timor-Leste
literally over the barrel with its delaying tactics in
negotiations over disputed oil and gas rights, thereby denying
desperately needed revenue to the country in its crucial first
years. Timor-Leste has the lowest per capita GDP in the world,
$400, with over 40% of the population still subsisting below the
poverty line on less than 50 US cents per day, although the
first $600 million of oil revenue have now been received and
billions more are expected in coming years. Food production is a
huge problem in this fertile, devastated land yet Australia and
the World Bank refused to rebuild the rice industry (when
imports amounted to a succulent $220 million per year). With
massive unemployment, the streets are full of traumatised and
alienated youth with a great capacity for violence, and
susceptible to attempts of diehard former militia, political
factions and pro-Indonesia elements to create instability. The
average age of the population is 20 years.

Another major disaffected group is the former Falantil (Forças
Armadas de Libertação Nacional de Timor-Leste), who fought for
independence. As an alliance of different ethnic groups, they
prevailed in the 24 years of independence struggle largely
because of their grassroots-politics skills in the local
communities in which they moved. Yet the “non-political” police
force, with its better (Indonesian) training, was given priority
by the transitional United Nations government (UNTAET, 1999 –
2002) in creating the country’s (European-style) security
forces. Some communities were thus over-represented and others
very under-represented in terms of loyalties and recognition in
a situation where all jobs were scarce. Herein lie the roots of
the “new” development of east-west hostilities and much
responsibility for this may be laid at the door of the UN and
its advisers from King’s College London. Falintil demoralisation
and anger was clear as early as 2000. "Falantil sees itself as a
force that gained the victory but has never even had a victory
parade", reported The Australian at the time (28 June 2000).

Added to this (already Molotov) cocktail of the factors involved
in the present crisis, are the ideological and personal
differences between President Xanana Gusmao and Mari Alkatiri,
which were soon represented, inter alia, in the east-west ethnic
hostilities. Then, Defence Minister Roque Rodrigues and army
chief Brig. Gen. Taur Matan Ruak sacked some 600 (mainly
westerner) troops in March after demonstrations against
discrimination. They were acting on UN legal advice, which did
not save the Prime Minister from being held responsible or from
being openly criticised by President Xanana Gusmao, which
inflamed matters even more.

The “wily Marxist” (The Australian, May 31) Alkatiri is held
responsible for everything, except in his own party Fretilin,
which led the country to independence. Here he has up to 200,000
relatively politicised and mobilisable supporters, which, no
doubt, is one reason why Australian Foreign Minister Alexander
Downer changed his tune about ousting Alkatiri. In contrast to
the wily Marxist terrorist are his political rivals the
“universally loved and admired” (ibid) President Xanana Gusmao,
the “ever-obliging” (ibid) Nobel laureate Foreign Minister (and
new Defence Minister) José Ramos-Horta and the “popular”
Australian troops who have arrived to save the country, though
they have been criticised for being notably passive about the
arson and looting in sectarian attacks. The rebel leader Major
Alfredo Reinado (loyal to Xanana Gusmao, grateful to Australian
troops, lover of Australian VB beer and enemy of Alkatiri) is
described in surprisingly neutral terms: he is merely
“swaggering” and “Australian-trained”.

“Mozambique” means “Marxist” in this story. During the
occupation years the former Portuguese colony (and let us not
forget historic links) offered scholarships for Timorese to
study so that they would be prepared to return to their country
as well-prepared leaders. With an academic background in law and
economics, his work as a surveyor and his lobbying experience at
the UN and in Africa, Mari Alkatiri was, thanks to his long
years in exile in Mozambique, by far the best-equipped Timorese
to negotiate the Timor Sea Agreement with Australia over natural
gas and oil resources. His toughness and evident negotiating
skills did not endear him to the Australians, who resorted to
withdrawing from the International Tribunal for the Law of the
Sea and unilaterally issuing licences.

Again, Alkatiri was one of the main architects of the Magna
Carta of the National Council of Timorese Resistance, a document
that brought the country’s future policies in line with
international standards (such as those set by the International
Tribunal for the Law of the Sea). An economic nationalist, he is
concerned about environmental and women’s issues and is against
privatisation of electricity. He sees the need to diversify the
country’s economic options and believes that a state-owned
petroleum company assisted by Norway, Portugal, China, Malaysia
and Brazil will benefit Timor-Leste more than giving Australia a
monopoly on its oil and gas. Among other “unpatriotic” acts, he
proposed scrapping primary school fees, rejected World Bank
loans (Timor-Leste is debt-free), brought Cuban doctors to work
in rural areas and set up a new medical school at the national
university. Alkatiri is also condemned, as if he alone were
responsible, for Portuguese being the country’s official
language. The lingua franca, Tetum, and Portuguese have much in
common after hundreds of years of colonial contact so some
linguists argue it is a logical choice, but maintaining this
Lusophone link and wisely diversifying diplomatic and economic
options may not be viewed so kindly in Australian official
circles.

The Prime Minister is also “arrogant”, which he happily accepts
in an interview with the Spanish daily El País (2 June, 2006).
“Arrogant? Even my family says so. But I am sensitive. What I
don’t have is this Javanese culture of smiling at everything and
then stabbing people in the back.” This could also be called
directness. Certainly, the man who comes across in this
interview (where he is exceptionally permitted press space to
speak for himself) is intelligent, witty and ironic, not to
mention patriotic, qualities that are absent in second-hand
portrayals of him in the Australian press. With regard to the
contrasting personal styles of the President and the Prime
Minister, it is also fair to point out a certain division of
labour. Unlike the much more visible, among-the-people Xanana
Gusmao, Alkatiri in his world of facts, figures and policy
doesn’t particularly require charm and other PR skills.

On June 4, an editorial in The Australian, apropos of the
possibility of ousting Timor-Leste’s Prime Minister (because
“regime change” is what it is all about for everyone from the
Australian Prime Minister John Howard, the rebel leader Reinado,
Ramos-Horta, first lady Kirsty Sword Gusmao … who have all said
so in so many words), opined, “And while he commands a
parliamentary majority, there is not a great deal, beyond the
most discreet diplomatic advice, that Australians can do to
secure the essential circuit-breaker his departure would
provide.” The Australian government is set on achieving this
“circuit-breaker” (a quaint euphemism for coup) through its
peace-keeping operation. There are very big issues at stake in
the “tiny statelet”, another term journalists like to use as if
smallness can divert our attention from them: abundant oil and
natural gas resources, with China as a prospective partner,
rejection of Australian aid-tied agricultural liberalisation
policies and flying in the face of big-power politics in
general. Ramos-Horta, however, is very sympathetic to big-power
security considerations, writing (in a prophetic foretaste of
what the press is now saying about his country) of the US
occupation of Iraq. “Retreat is not a viable option for the
costs would be far too high for U.S. vital interests in the
Middle East and the world as a whole. Iraq would inevitably
descend into a Somalia-like failed state […]. (Asian Wall Street
Journal, 17 October 2005). Is he equally understanding about
Australia’s “vital interests”?

The scene was set for a “circuit-breaker” a long time ago in the
name of these interests. An Australian Defence Force document
dated 10 May 2001 states, “Policy guidance ... is caveated [sic]
by the consideration that Australia has limited direct control
over the development of the East Timor Defence Force […]. The
first objective ... is to pursue Australia’s broad strategic
interests in East Timor, namely denial, access and influence.
The strategic interest of denial seeks to ensure that no foreign
power gains an unacceptable level of access to East Timor, and
is coupled with the complementary objective of seeking access to
East Timor for Australia, in particular the ADF. Australia’s
strategic interests can also be protected and pursued more
effectively if Australia maintains some degree of influence over
East Timor’s decision-making.” Australia has begun a long
occupation of Timor-Leste and is well positioned, with very
“direct control”, to pursue its “strategic interest of denial”
and, however much this looks like a coup, the press will pursue
its “strategic interest of denial” as well.

Julie Wark is a (Spanish and Catalan) translator with 30
years experience in different areas of human rights, mainly in
Indonesia, East Timor and West Papua. She is co-author of
INDONESIA: LAW, PROPAGANDA AND TERROR (London: Zed Books 1983)
and has published numerous essays and articles" .

Estêvão says you can say, "Estêvão Cabral is long-time member of
Fretilin, PhD in International Relations from the University of
Lancaster (UK) and author of numerous articles on East Timor".

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